Sunday, June 22, 2008

101 Ways to Interfere with a Nursing Mother and Infant

London , May 11 (ANI): Babies fed with cow milk may be at a greater risk of developing type 1 diabetes in later life, says a new study.

A 1993 study conducted by Finish researchers had revealed that consuming dairy products early was linked to diabetes risk.

This is because beta-lactoglobulin, a protein in cow’s stimulate babies to make antibodies that also attack glycodelin, a protein vital for training the immune system.

This in turn disturbs immune system, thereby misguidedly destroying insulin-producing pancreatic cells, leading to type 1 diabetes.

Supporting the previous findings, Marcia Goldfarb of the company Anatek-EP in Portland , Maine , also discovered five children with type 1 diabetes, who were fed cow’s-milk formula and all had antibodies to beta lactoglobulin.

“It’s fascinating, but needs more back-up data,” New Scientist quoted Mikael Knip of the Hospital for Children and Adolescents in Helsinki , Finland , as saying. He is conducting further study, TRIGR, to test whether children fed formula have a lower risk of disease than those fed with hydrolysed version, where the milk proteins have been broken down.

http://www.thaindian.com/newsportal/health/early-consumption-of-cows-milk-may-boost-diabetes-risk-re-issue_10047549.html

I found this particular article extremely interesting since I, myself, have recently developed Type II diabetes as have a good number of my siblings; and, there is some evidence coming out now that even Type II diabetes could be related to early nutrition. Many of us baby boomers were probably the first experimental generation with so many formula-fed babies. Frequently cereals were introduced into our bottles at any early age. This was a common way of feeding babies then, in order to fill them up and help them sleep more. It appears breast milk is more easily digested by infants; and, thus babies must wake up more often when they are breast fed in order to be fed more.

So giving a bottle with a little baby cereal mixed in it was seen as a harmless method of providing a more filling early diet to infants and giving them a sounder sleep.

Additionally in an old Joslin Diabetes Center newsletter from December 1, 2004, which I only read about a year or so ago, there was a reprint of a New York Times article claiming that early introduction of cereals into an infant’s diet could also be responsible for the vast increase of diabetes in the west. A study in Germany and another follow-up one in the United States appears to show some “correlation between diabetes and early introduction of cereals and other foods into the diet of infants at genetic risk of the disease”.

Regarding all these allergies young children appear to be suffering from today, I have also seen another study claiming that early introduction of cereals could be a contributing factor in that as well. Especially these horrible peanut allergies since many cereals have some extract of peanuts introduced into them, either peanut oil or some other peanut additive.

Last but not least, a medical alert from the John Hopkins Medical Center is warning how plastic containers or bottles holding foods or liquids can leech into the contents when heated up or frozen (as in freezing plastic water bottles or microwaving foods in plastic containers). This is becoming noticable now with so many veterans of the Iraq war beginning to turn up with immune disorders after eating those ready-to-eat meals served in plastic and heated up in microwaves for them over in Iraq. Probably they are freezing water botttles as well to keep them colder. Absorb all your nourishment from these items for a few years and God only knows what will turn up in your body.

Anyway, anyone who has had to prepare formula for a baby knows you have to sterilize bottles and nipples (many today containing some plastic or silicon additive) BEFORE feeding them to an infant.

Yet in spite of more and more evidence cropping up that breast milk is by far the best and safest nourishment for infants (not to mention the most economical), I just recently had the opportunity to glance through one of those books (there are dozens of them out now) instructing men on how best to establish a relationship with a nursing infant. This particular one had practically an entire section dedicated to giving men instructions on this issue: which could basically have been titled 101 Tips to Interfere with a Nursing mother and Infant. Even to the point of encouraging a young mother to bottle feed instead of breast feed, just so the father could have a chance to feed the infant as well, totally self-centered and selfish behavior on the part of men.

As usual the best interest of children can be tossed out the window at the latest whim of men, that’s the message I got from that book.

Grow up already you nitwits, that's my message.

Tuesday, June 03, 2008

Evolution of Poverty into a Crime against the State

The following article shows how being too poor to support your children has now morphed into a felony, whereas previously it was considered just an unfortunate circumstance of life. Of course I don't need to point out how poverty disportionately impacts the African-American community and how this Johnson administration change in dealing with children in poverty has been the impetus to the custody wars that are now raging in every comminity across our nation.

So once again we see how the greed of men inevitably winds up paving the way to war.

BTW, this particular case was overturned on a technicality which doesn't mean that thousands of poor people aren't already languishing in prison due to not being able to afford an appeal. It's probably just the tip of the iceberg we see here with this one case in Virginia...

http://www.wvrecord.com/news/212940-justices-say-legislature-wrong-on-felony-child-support

Justices say Legislature wrong on felony child support
5/29/2008 8:30 AM
By Steve Korris -Statehouse Bureau

CHARLESTON - West Virginia legislators violated state and national constitutions when they forced fathers facing felony child support charges to prove they couldn't pay, the Supreme Court of Appeals decided May 23.

The Justices unanimously erased a law stating that in child support prosecutions "the defendant's alleged inability to reasonably provide the required support may be raised only as an affirmative defense, after reasonable notice to the State."

The law "unconstitutionally shifts to a defendant the burden of disproving an element of the offense," Justice Robin Davis wrote. "We have previously observed that it is a foundation of criminal law that the State must prove all the elements of a crime beyond a reasonable doubt."

The law violates due process under Article III of the West Virginia Constitution and the 14th Amendment to the United States Constitution, she wrote.

The Justices granted a new trial to Gabriel Stamm in Harrison County after Circuit Judge James Matish sentenced him to prison for a year to three years.

Matish also ordered Stamm to pay court costs and to make restitution of $7,386 to the mother of his child, Rebecca Roth, and $1,864 to the state.

Officers arrested Stamm Dec. 22, 2005, on a complaint from Roth that he hadn't made a monthly payment in more than a year.

He had acknowledged paternity in March 2004, and for a few months he had paid Roth $167.52 a month.

Grand jurors indicted him in 2006 on a felony charge of failure to meet an obligation to provide support to a minor.

Stamm moved to dismiss on constitutional grounds. Matish denied the motion.

At trial, Stamm asserted inability to pay as an affirmative defense.

When the state closed its case, Stamm moved for acquittal. He argued that the state failed to demonstrate his ability to pay.

Matish denied the motion, so Stamm presented evidence for his inability to pay and moved again for acquittal. Again Matish denied it.

"If the evidence of inability to pay creates a reasonable doubt in the minds of the jury whether the accused could reasonably provide the support obligation at the time alleged in the indictment, then the jury must return a verdict of not guilty," Matish told jurors.

Jurors found Stamm guilty of the felony charge and Matish sentenced him.

On appeal, Harrison County assistant prosecutor Kurt Hall argued that Matish's instruction cured any problem of due process.

Davis disagreed, writing that Matish "did not make it absolutely clear that the burden remained on the State to prove, beyond doubt, Mr. Stamm's inability to pay."

"... the instruction could have misled the jury into believing that Mr. Stamm bore the burden of proof as to his ability to pay support," Davis wrote.

Greta Davis of Public Defender Corporation in Clarksburg represented Stamm.